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Human Rights Compliance Assessment

The HRCA is a comprehensive tool designed to detect human rights risks in company operations. It covers all internationally recognized human rights and their impact on all stakeholders, including employees, local communities, customers and host governments.

The tool incorporates a database of 195 questions and 947 indicators, each measuring the implementation of human rights in company policies and procedures. The database incorporates the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and more than 80 human rights treaties and International Labour Organization conventions. The standards and indicators in the database are constantly updated to incorporate feedback from company users and developments in international human rights law.

The tool is available online to subscribers, and the Web interface allows companies to develop a tailored assessment tool from the database by screening out questions based on country risk and features of the company operation. Companies answer the relevant questions and receive a final report identifying areas of compliance and non-compliance in their operations. Numeric scores allow companies to track their performance from year to year.

The development of the HRCA involved a six-year process involving more than 80 companies and human rights groups from 14 European countries. The process was designed to ensure that the standards and indicators in the tool reflected the legal standards of the NGO community and the on-the-ground business realities of multinational companies.

The HRCA can be used in a number of different forms depending on company profile and needs. HRCA tools include:

The full HRCA database, which allows companies to build a checklist according to their size, activities and countries of operation.

The HRCA Quick Check, a free, condensed version of the full tool

The Dalit Discrimination Check, covering caste discrimination in South Asia

The South Africa HRCA

The China Business and Social Sustainability Check

The Danish Institute for Human Rights also develops tailored checklists for companies and industries.

The Human Rights and Business Department is the world’s largest business-focused team of human rights specialists. We maintain the institutional backing of a leading National Human Rights Institution and a network of more than 100 human rights organizations around the world.

The Human Rights and Business Department and The Danish Institute for Human Rights are nonprofit organisations. All proceeds go directly to research and related activities aimed at promoting and strengthening human rights worldwide.